Chapter 22
Lanston
In the lastfour days of travel, I’ve found Ophelia to be more inspiring than I initially thought. She tries a new flavor of coffee each morning, determined to experience things to the fullest. I even indulged her a few times, curious to try some of the fancier lattes with cream. I’m reluctant to admit that I finally see the craze behind it.
We explore the compartments, measuring how long it takes to get from one end to the next to pass the time—truly idiotic things, but our laughter rings out loud and true. We find out the hard way that phantoms can indeed still get motion sick. Perhaps it is our willingness to still feel alive that promotes such anomalies as nausea. I hold Ophelia’s hair out of her face while she throws up in the bathroom sink.
At each stop, we find new books and different foods to try. The back of the train looks more like a fortress of piled novels and empty bags of chips, blankets that we stockpiled into a bed.
“How childish my parents would think of me if they could see me right now,” Ophelia says with a breathy laugh.
We’re pressed close in the fuzzy faux-fur blankets we laid out on the floor. She has a red licorice in her hand and draws it across her bottom lip lazily. Her fingers are slender—the bones beneath create prominent rises in her knuckles. On her side, the dress caves into her midsection and lines her hip bone. I want to smooth my hand over her curves and feel every inch of her skin—the dips and valleys of her beautiful soul. We’ve kept to just kissing, but our fervent bodies seem to have a more intimate agenda. I’m transfixed for a moment, hardly hearing her.
She gives me a hard stare and I know I’ve missed something.
“Hm?”
“Lanston!” She pouts and I laugh apologetically. Her body is against me, thighs brushing mine and sharing heat.
“I’m sorry. Something about your parents, right?” I look at her innocently. Her eyebrows flatten, but she lets it go.
“Yeah, they always thought I was childish.” She bites down on the licorice and tears it away, handing it to me for a bite. I eagerly take it.
It’s hard not to roll my eyes at the idea of what others consider childish. “Miserable people don’t want others to find joy in simple things. That’s all it is,” I say before taking a bite and thinking to myself that she just took a bite of the same candy. It makes my cheeks warm.
She lets her head fall in my direction. Her purple hair pools in lovely curls, haloing her face. Those brown eyes pierce straight through me.
Our lips are so close I can smell the sweet candy on her. I swallow hard in an effort to redirect my brain before I get an erection.
“They were definitely miserable,” she says with a flat expression. Her eyes lower to my lips and I watch the same thoughts cross her mind—of tossing in the blankets, limbs tangled and pressed close against one another. Our skin bare and smooth as we connect, as we fall into one another.
Her cheeks redden and she turns her head away. I reach my hand out and gently grip her chin, pulling her face back toward me.
“What has your mind so lost?” I whisper.
In the dark train compartment, alone, it feels required to speak in a hushed tone, even as ghosts. Her nose is a mere inch from my own. The floral scent that mingles in her hair and smile makes me ache for her in every way a man could possibly burn for another.
She holds her breath, not sure if she should answer. I wait, and in the few moments that pass, I know I’d wait patiently for anything she’d have to say.
“You talk about what’s inside your head so easily… I want to share things with you too, but I can’t force myself to say them. Could I maybe write them down for you instead?” She speaks hesitantly like she’s expecting to be shut down. I wonder how many times before she’s tried to open up and her words and ideas had fallen on closed, cruel ears.
“I’d love nothing more,” I say, reassuring her. She lights up and her eyes glimmer like pools of honey. “On one condition.”
Ophelia raises a brow in question.
An endearing grin spreads across my lips. The realest one I’ve felt in a long time. “When you give me a letter, I’ll give you a drawing. We needn’t ever speak about what we read or see; we only need to accept them.”
A short breath escapes her lips and she beams at me. “But should we want to?”
“Then we can talk until the sun rises.”
“And if we need more time than that?”
I laugh, taken by this sweet, broken ghost. “Then we’ll talk until our voices can no longer carry the weight of our words.”
She gives me a daring smile and says, “And if further?”
“When our voices die, I’ll trace my fingers across your skin and tell you stories with my touch.”
Ophelia is silent, studying my features briefly before murmuring, “Why are you so kind, Lanston? I’m not a good person.” The weakness in her tone betrays all the emotions she refuses to show.
That admittance hurts; it swells painfully inside my chest as death once had.
“Why don’t you think you’re a good person?” I ask.
She only closes her eyes.
“Maybe I can tell you in a letter someday.”
I lean forward and press my forehead to hers. She looks into my eyes before they softly flutter shut. My hand rises over the curve of her waist and I kiss her. A piece of my soul opens, and she reaches right into my chest.
She arches her back to get closer, our kiss deepening as she traces her fingers across my jaw. Blood flows to my core as our tongues chase each other. Ophelia’s entire body goes limp in my arms as she surrenders herself to me. Her hands trail down my neck and glide across my collarbones, sending chills up my spine. My cock throbs painfully inside my pants as we tangle in the blankets.
Ophelia lies splayed out on the floor beneath me as I break our connection and start dotting her neck with kisses, nipping her skin enough to draw soft moans from her lips.
“Lanston,” she cries, threading her fingers through my hair as I slip her dress off her shoulders and pull it down enough to expose her breasts. I draw my tongue over her plump flesh, sucking her nipple into my mouth and swirling my tongue over it.
She writhes beneath me, breathy cries and moans slipping from her mouth. I can tell she wants more and is impatient for it.
A dark chuckle rises from my throat and I raise my head to look at her, finding desperate eyes staring back at me. I lean back up to kiss her and she makes a small, weakened sound as I press my erection against her core.
Her hands slip beneath my shirt and duck into the hem of my pants.
I grin against her lips. “You want more?” She nods, drunk with lust.
She unbuttons my pants and yanks them down. A dry laugh escapes me, and I bury my face in her hair, finding her ear and biting the cartilage gently. She breathes heavily as she frees my dick, quickly wrapping her hand around my girth and eliciting a low groan that rolls from my lips.
“Oh, fuck,” I say weakly as she starts pumping me. Her soft fingers pull me all the way to the tip and work me down back to the base in a slow rhythm.
I look down at her, biting her lower lip. Her eyes drip with lust, greedy and wanting me to touch her. Who am I to deny her?
My lips crash down to hers and our bodies move fiercely together, starved from all the moments we’d resisted before. I run my hand down her stomach and lift her dress. She whimpers eagerly and I can’t help but grin against her lips.
“Patience, Ophelia,” I say, hushed and languid. Her thighs are warm and she bucks her hips as I squeeze her flesh, inching closer to her core and stopping just before I reach her panties. “Have I told you how beautiful you are, or have I only been saying it over and over in my head?” I ask, breathless.
She nips at my lower lip and that sends a surge of heat through my dick.
“You must’ve been saying it in your head,” she replies, smiling and burying her face into the crook of my neck. “Tell me.”
She releases her firm hold on my cock and guides it to her stomach. I groan at the soft sensation of her skin against my tip, lowering my body to the blankets and rolling to my back. She follows the momentum and straddles me, sitting perfectly on my dick—nothing but her thin panties between us.
I look up at her through hooded eyes, high off the ecstasy that builds between us.
She sets her hands on my chest and starts grinding on top of me. I buck my hips involuntarily and fist the sheets. She looks down at me like a goddess, expectantly.
“I can’t take my eyes off of you, not even for a moment.” It takes a great deal of control to keep my words and tone even as she continues to dry hump me, but I keep my voice steady. I want her to know how much I truly cherish her. “I knew it the moment I laid eyes on you in the theater. Your somber dance and the weight of the world you carried so effortlessly. Your beauty is the kind the world hushes around, to stare in silence and listen.”
Her movements slow until she stills. Her hands slide up my chest until she falls to her elbows, braced on either side of my head.
“You say the most beautiful things,” she says softly. Our noses are barely touching as she stares down into my soul. “Hopeless romantic or tragic poet?” Her lips kick up in a lovely smile and I laugh, wrapping my arms around her.
“Hopeless romantic.”
She nods knowingly. “That’s what I pinned you for.” Then she kisses me and we roll in the blankets. She lies on her side as I do mine. I push her underwear to the side and find the evidence of her arousal. A groan rolls from my throat as I stroke her clit; her reaction is instant, arching into our fervent kisses more and moaning as she fists my cock again.
We remain in tandem, breathing heavily as our release builds. She strokes me faster and slower until I can no longer see clearly, and I grunt as I come in her hand. She slows and works the tip until my hips stop jerking.
I can tell she’s close too, her teeth bury into her lower lip and she gasps as I push a finger inside her. Our lips meet again and I rub her clit until she’s quivering in my arms. I don’t stop until she cries out with her release and I know she’s satiated.
She looks me over one last time before smiling and tucking her head into the crook of my neck. I smile, too, wrapping my arms around her and pressing a kiss atop her head.
“Dream of me,” she whispers drowsily. A warmth spreads into my heart as we lie together, two phantoms on a train and falling into orbit with each other. Do our dreams matter? I hope so.
“I always do.”
Ophelia stretches her arms over her head as we finally get off the last train in New York.
I’m hesitant and linger on the last step. I’ve never been this far in the world, not ever. The East Coast was always a dream of mine, even just to visit. Boston comes to mind, with the two people who mean the most to me somewhere in the forest of buildings and cement. I wonder if they think of me. I try not to linger on the missed anniversary. It’s not fair to be upset over it. It’s only natural for them to move on, after all.
Ophelia notices my pause and smiles, offering me her hand.
“Come on, we can create new makeshift beds elsewhere if we need to.” Her voice is light and airy, lifting the corner of my lips and making me forget the woes that tug at my heart.
“What, like two traveling vagabonds? We can stay wherever we wish, you know. We should stay somewhere nice,” I say with amusement. She raises her chin and walks proudly through the platform. It’s bustling with people, all wearing blank expressions and bleak-colored clothing. They don’t notice us of course. The brick pillars of the platform are larger than I thought possible. It’s like stepping into an entirely new world. My expression must give away my awe because Ophelia laughs beside me.
“Pretty amazing, isn’t it?” she says with a light flickering across her eyes.
I nod. “This must be how the city folks feel when they come to the mountains of Montana.”
Ophelia laughs in agreement. “Yeah, no kidding. Just shows you how used to our surroundings we become.”
The awe doesn’t leave me as we make our way through the city, armed with hands clasped tightly together and a few stolen kisses.
We end up finding a nice hotel right on the coast. Fancy. One that we could never afford when we were alive. The penthouse is the size of a ballroom, with a full kitchen, four bedrooms, and a living room for entertaining a crowd. But she was right; even though we’re surrounded by the finest cotton sheets and luxury beds, we pile the blankets onto the floor of the living room and spread out all the things we’ve already accumulated along the way. Books, snacks we haven’t tried yet, clothing from gift shops, and an entire bouquet of roses Ophelia found at a flower store just down the street. The roses are dark red and still full of life.
Our plan is to set out first thing in the morning and go onto our next bucket list idea. I cross out, Ride a train somewhere new, and glance up at Ophelia. She’s lying on the ground on her stomach, feet crossed in the air behind her, writing in her notebook with a vintage pen.
Lanston Ophelia’s Bucket List
Go to Paris
Sail a yacht
Ballroom dance
Drink on the beach at night/camp out
Ride a train somewhere new
Visit Ireland’s Trinity College Library
Save a stray plant
“Let’s sail a yacht to Europe. Then we can cross off Paris and Ireland while we’re there,” I say as I tuck the paper back into my pocket. I have a good feeling about this bucket list idea. My soul already feels more at ease. Though I’m not sure how much it has to do with the places we visit as much as it does who I’m spending it with.
Ophelia looks back at me from over her shoulder and smiles. “That’s a lovely plan.” Her eyes glimmer with the mere thought of it. “It’s been a dream of mine to dance on the stage of Palais Garnier. It’s one of the most famous opera houses in the world.”
“The what?” I ask, feeling silly for not knowing of it, but then again she’s much more of a historical enthusiast than me.
She laughs and pushes herself up to face me. Her black dress, peasant-styled with long sleeves that ruffle at the ends, pools around her legs. “Palais Garnier. You’ll see when we get to France. I’d show you a picture, but it will be much more impressive in person.”
I try to imagine what a historic opera house looks like; all I can picture are white buildings with massive pillars, like the ones in Roman movies with gladiators.
“Are you going to perform alone?” I rest my head against my palm.
“I always do, but I wouldn’t mind a partner for this one if you’re up for it.” She stares at me, hopeful, and my stomach drops. I wasn’t expecting her to ask me.
“Um—”
“I’ll teach you!” She quickly cuts me off and stands, grabbing my hands and pulling me up off the recliner I was very much comfortable in.
“Ophelia,” I say her name slowly, heavily implying I don’t want to learn, but she ignores me and shows me the footing instead.
Reluctantly and with a smile that’s all too natural, I move in step with her. One, two, three. One, two, three. Dip, spin. She laughs at my clumsy feet as I struggle not to trip over myself.
“Okay, now take my hands.” Ophelia presents her hands to me.
My fingertips glide over her smooth palms. Her skin sends chills down my spine and nervousness threads through my stomach. I don’t want to embarrass myself; she’s fluid in her steps and motions, while I’m inept.
“Perfect, now this one goes around my waist,” she mutters as she sets my left hand on her side. I move closer, closing the gap between us and breathing in her sweet scent. My throat bobs as I swallow, sliding my hand to her lower back.
Ophelia leads, moving in the steps she taught me, and surprisingly, after a few tries we start to move effortlessly. Our feet are in rhythm with one another and when we come to a stop, our breaths heavy, I can’t look away from her eyes.
Dancing with Wynn was the only time I’d ever done so. It was nice and I loved every second of it. But with Ophelia, it feels like so much more. As if our hands were molded to fit into one another’s—like the stars demand our union and celebrate the ground we move on.
It’s intimate and soft.
I brush her hair back, tracing the angles of her face with my eyes. Our lips are nearly brushing. Each breath I take presses our chests together, sending a thick ache through my entire body and reminding me of last night.
But as I lower my head and she lifts her chin, we both freeze.
Whispers.
Her eyes widen and panic spreads over her face. All the blood in my veins turns to ice. I jerk my head back to look behind me and all I can see is darkness; the penthouse is cloaked in shadows, a black hole in the midst of the day.
Has it followed us? All the way here?
“Lanston!” Ophelia screams. The sound of her voice is so piercing it shakes my consciousness. I’m moving in her direction before I can even turn my head completely. She’s standing halfway out the window and once she makes eye contact with me and knows I see her, she lets herself fall. Her hair is the last I see of her before I’m leaping from the window after her. I turn enough to see black wisps of shadows clinging near the window’s edge where dark coils writhe in anger.
My heart races with thunderous fear. Ophelia looks much calmer now, staring at me with half-lidded eyes and a relieved smile as the wind lashes around her face.
We’re falling from a twenty-story building and a different sort of fear consumes me. One that is both exhilarating and filled with terror all at once. Rationally, I know we cannot die, but I don’t know what will happen once we reach the bottom. Will we bleed? Will I feel pain?
I despise pain with my entire being.
The ground approaches at an alarming rate, swift and lethal. My instincts tell me to brace for the end, but I only shut my eyes.
The thud of our bodies is vociferous. I only feel a mild tingling across my skin, like I’ve been stung by bees but the sensation swiftly fades.
When my eyes open, I find Ophelia lying on her side before me. I’m on mine as well. She looks like she’s merely asleep. No blood or broken bones jutting from her skin. Just asleep. Though the tears that form beneath her lashes tell me she’s very much awake.
“It’s okay,” I whisper, reaching my hand to her arm in an attempt to comfort her.
She shifts back, leaving my hand cold in the space between us. Does she think it’s her fault that the darkness chases her?
Her head shakes slowly. “It’s not.”
When I don’t respond, she slowly sits up and wipes her tears. I watch as she seals herself away once more inside her castle of safeguards.
And I know she’s going to try to lock herself away again.